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To begin, I would like to thank everyone that posts and responds on this thread, not only has your information been helpful, it has been greatly motivational. I have read many breakdowns and I will post mine in a dissimilar way, more of a walk through than a break down (although this information is available elsewhere). It was my first attempt so this was all new for me.
I would recommend visiting the testing center beforehand, the one that I went to looked nothing like a place of business, it was located in what looked like a cluster of condominiums. Fortunately I thought it was required to go there to schedule and when it was test day I was not freaking out because I didn't know where to go. When you get in you will need two forms of ID (not 1 like the GRE), they will fingerprint you, and take your picture. The center allowed us to keep your belongings in a locker that you could access during your 15 minute break between the PAT and the RC. During this break I was allowed to return to my car if I so chose. The person that I asked was unsure if you could study in between sections but if someone had an equation sheet of areas and volumes for the QR in there car I think they could conceivably look at it during the break. When the test begins you get two laminated (front and back) pieces of paper that are blank except a heading about the rules on one side and grided with the same heading on the other side.
How I studied for this test, went through Kaplan DAT book and Barrons DAT book. Both were good for the material. Barrons was more topical which was nice to start with, it also had strategies for PAT section, and it was a lot cheaper. The problem with barrons was that the practice tests at the end of the book were littered with errors, which was really disappointed and disheartening if you sit down for 4.5 hours and don't get a good measure of your readiness. Kaplans was very in depth and covered the material well, the level of detail in the bio section was on par with Cliffs, but the OChem and GenChem was not nearly as helpful as CHAD's and at a pricetag of about 70$ I would recommend getting it in the stead of taking the kaplan class but its avoidable with the use of Cliffs + CHAD. Chad's videos are bomb, I watched them once, did all the quizzes PRINTED THE GO ALONG SHEETS (this is important) took detailed notes and then leading up to test day I relaxed and watched them passively for sections I was unclear on. If I were to use one resource (although he does not cover bio) I would use Chad's videos, they are that good. Cliff's bio is long and detailed but I would go through it and learn everything you don't already know. Crack DAT PAT 10 Test is what you need for PAT, It is expensive but it the best there is for this section, do the tests, get familiar, and you will get better. It should be noted that the explanations for patern folding would not manipulate on my macbook, this was frustrating because I thought it was one of the more difficult of the six sections. It is also nice that Crack DAT PAT has a very similar interface compared to the actual DAT, this was comforting on test day. The above materials were most helpful, others I used to a lesser extent were google, wikipedia, Kaplan AP bio, Princeton Review AP bio, Kaplans MCAT Flashcards, Exam Krackers Audio Osmosis, and notes posted on this site, and the ADA practice test. I utilized a flashcard program called ProVoc (I think its mac exclusive unfortunately, that was helpful for bio, it has a nice interface, I recommend checking it out)
Now for the Results- (% notes the percentile)
PAT- 20 (85.4%)
QR- 20 (89.3%)
RC- 22 (90.3%)
Bio- 18 (64.6%)
GC- 22 (90.1%)
OC- 18 (62.6%)
TS- 19 (76.6%)
AA- 20 (87.1%)🙂
Sections
PAT- noticeably different than Crack DAT- relies a lot more in differences of size in congruent shape and size of indentation more than its location. Apperature passing is tough, TFE is less about line counting and more about looking at the object and trying to get an idea of what this actually looks like in 3D (the actual purpose of the examation- who would have thought?), angle ranking is not as big of a bear as everyone says it was, or atleast I felt that way, there was considerably more variation in answer choices in this section than in Crack DAT which changes the dynamic of answer choosing. Cube counting and hole punching are easily masterable and I think that these sections should be gone through as efficiently as possible to maximize time with the others. Patern Folding is tough, some cubes, some irregular shapes, it was different from crack DAT in that the shapes were not so boxy and the emphasis was not so much on where pieces with different embroidering were located, more about what the shape would look like.
RC- I went in looking to do Vicvipers but the structure of the test is more conducive to regular search and destroy. First you are given the passage, then as you click next there is a question and the whole passage is located underneath the question and answer. I did not get piano'd and my paragraphs were 12, 15, and 13 I believe. The questions were mostly chronological, some tone (not many), BUT SOME COMMON SCIENCE
QUESTIONS- (after all they are science passages) and by this I mean things that you probably knew before you took this exam, I attribute some of my success to answering these questions (because I was almost sure I already knew the answer), marking them, and coming back to them if I had extra time. Be time aware in this section- no question should take you more than 2 minutes before you complete the rest
QR- a big disappointment- I am very very good at math and went through math destroyer with few mistakes. The questions are simplistic with very awkward, lengthy, yoda wording. I did the big mistake of staring at two questions in particular for over three minutes, I think five on one, this was a big mistake, I rushed through the rest, took shortcuts on some questions by looking at what answers were feasible to begin with (which is a good strategy after you work through- not to begin with). Math destroyer is on point for this section, beware of the calculator trap it is VERY slow, some clicks do not register and because this is a timed section I would aim for limited use.
Bio- 50% extremely basic 25% college intermediate bio 25% challenging, wordy, and random. I went through this test with at least 5 of the first 10 as head scratchers- worded in strange ways. I spent half of my time studying for this section and I only got an 18. I thought that logically it did not make sense for an exam about dental admission to test much on plants so I skimmed that material instead of going in depth- DONT MAKE THIS MISTAKE
GC- I though this was very easy, I understand that its a logarathmic scale but I thought that I was going to score above a 22 and I'm not chem major (human nutrition actually). Watch chads for this
OC- tough because there are so many exceptions, about 7-8 predict the products, again the best info I can give is to watch chads, I was lucky to avoid any kind of spec but I had to use a lot of lewis diagrams and acid bases, I was surprised I got an 18, I though I would be closer to a 20 but I am content.
And now for the bad news- my gpa is 3.14 sci is 3.05 and I am a senior this year, my app is complete, it is relatively pretty and I am going to apply this cycle to NYU TUFTS (the two I would most like to go to) USC UNLV Midwestern and maybe BU or UoP. I am a white male so I do not have any minority points, I have been looking at last years cycle on predents.com (great resource) and I am cautious but not overly pessimistic. A one year non thesis masters would not be the worst thing in the world. The question that I pose is this, this term I am in two science classes, I am destroying them both (mostly because the material is concurrent with the DAT) and a math class (which I believe goes in the science GPA- please correct me if I am wrong), I have undoubtably an A in and will undoubtably get an A in. Ive done the calculations and this would push my GPA to a 3.21 and a 3.15 which looks a hell of a lot better if all goes well. My term ends first week of dec, grades posted in the middle of december, should I wait to submit my app? Would this jump in GPA be more helpful with a really late app or a worse GPA with a more time appropriate app.
Again, thank you all, best of luck with your current and future endeavors.
I would recommend visiting the testing center beforehand, the one that I went to looked nothing like a place of business, it was located in what looked like a cluster of condominiums. Fortunately I thought it was required to go there to schedule and when it was test day I was not freaking out because I didn't know where to go. When you get in you will need two forms of ID (not 1 like the GRE), they will fingerprint you, and take your picture. The center allowed us to keep your belongings in a locker that you could access during your 15 minute break between the PAT and the RC. During this break I was allowed to return to my car if I so chose. The person that I asked was unsure if you could study in between sections but if someone had an equation sheet of areas and volumes for the QR in there car I think they could conceivably look at it during the break. When the test begins you get two laminated (front and back) pieces of paper that are blank except a heading about the rules on one side and grided with the same heading on the other side.
How I studied for this test, went through Kaplan DAT book and Barrons DAT book. Both were good for the material. Barrons was more topical which was nice to start with, it also had strategies for PAT section, and it was a lot cheaper. The problem with barrons was that the practice tests at the end of the book were littered with errors, which was really disappointed and disheartening if you sit down for 4.5 hours and don't get a good measure of your readiness. Kaplans was very in depth and covered the material well, the level of detail in the bio section was on par with Cliffs, but the OChem and GenChem was not nearly as helpful as CHAD's and at a pricetag of about 70$ I would recommend getting it in the stead of taking the kaplan class but its avoidable with the use of Cliffs + CHAD. Chad's videos are bomb, I watched them once, did all the quizzes PRINTED THE GO ALONG SHEETS (this is important) took detailed notes and then leading up to test day I relaxed and watched them passively for sections I was unclear on. If I were to use one resource (although he does not cover bio) I would use Chad's videos, they are that good. Cliff's bio is long and detailed but I would go through it and learn everything you don't already know. Crack DAT PAT 10 Test is what you need for PAT, It is expensive but it the best there is for this section, do the tests, get familiar, and you will get better. It should be noted that the explanations for patern folding would not manipulate on my macbook, this was frustrating because I thought it was one of the more difficult of the six sections. It is also nice that Crack DAT PAT has a very similar interface compared to the actual DAT, this was comforting on test day. The above materials were most helpful, others I used to a lesser extent were google, wikipedia, Kaplan AP bio, Princeton Review AP bio, Kaplans MCAT Flashcards, Exam Krackers Audio Osmosis, and notes posted on this site, and the ADA practice test. I utilized a flashcard program called ProVoc (I think its mac exclusive unfortunately, that was helpful for bio, it has a nice interface, I recommend checking it out)
Now for the Results- (% notes the percentile)
PAT- 20 (85.4%)
QR- 20 (89.3%)
RC- 22 (90.3%)
Bio- 18 (64.6%)
GC- 22 (90.1%)
OC- 18 (62.6%)
TS- 19 (76.6%)
AA- 20 (87.1%)🙂
Sections
PAT- noticeably different than Crack DAT- relies a lot more in differences of size in congruent shape and size of indentation more than its location. Apperature passing is tough, TFE is less about line counting and more about looking at the object and trying to get an idea of what this actually looks like in 3D (the actual purpose of the examation- who would have thought?), angle ranking is not as big of a bear as everyone says it was, or atleast I felt that way, there was considerably more variation in answer choices in this section than in Crack DAT which changes the dynamic of answer choosing. Cube counting and hole punching are easily masterable and I think that these sections should be gone through as efficiently as possible to maximize time with the others. Patern Folding is tough, some cubes, some irregular shapes, it was different from crack DAT in that the shapes were not so boxy and the emphasis was not so much on where pieces with different embroidering were located, more about what the shape would look like.
RC- I went in looking to do Vicvipers but the structure of the test is more conducive to regular search and destroy. First you are given the passage, then as you click next there is a question and the whole passage is located underneath the question and answer. I did not get piano'd and my paragraphs were 12, 15, and 13 I believe. The questions were mostly chronological, some tone (not many), BUT SOME COMMON SCIENCE
QUESTIONS- (after all they are science passages) and by this I mean things that you probably knew before you took this exam, I attribute some of my success to answering these questions (because I was almost sure I already knew the answer), marking them, and coming back to them if I had extra time. Be time aware in this section- no question should take you more than 2 minutes before you complete the rest
QR- a big disappointment- I am very very good at math and went through math destroyer with few mistakes. The questions are simplistic with very awkward, lengthy, yoda wording. I did the big mistake of staring at two questions in particular for over three minutes, I think five on one, this was a big mistake, I rushed through the rest, took shortcuts on some questions by looking at what answers were feasible to begin with (which is a good strategy after you work through- not to begin with). Math destroyer is on point for this section, beware of the calculator trap it is VERY slow, some clicks do not register and because this is a timed section I would aim for limited use.
Bio- 50% extremely basic 25% college intermediate bio 25% challenging, wordy, and random. I went through this test with at least 5 of the first 10 as head scratchers- worded in strange ways. I spent half of my time studying for this section and I only got an 18. I thought that logically it did not make sense for an exam about dental admission to test much on plants so I skimmed that material instead of going in depth- DONT MAKE THIS MISTAKE
GC- I though this was very easy, I understand that its a logarathmic scale but I thought that I was going to score above a 22 and I'm not chem major (human nutrition actually). Watch chads for this
OC- tough because there are so many exceptions, about 7-8 predict the products, again the best info I can give is to watch chads, I was lucky to avoid any kind of spec but I had to use a lot of lewis diagrams and acid bases, I was surprised I got an 18, I though I would be closer to a 20 but I am content.
And now for the bad news- my gpa is 3.14 sci is 3.05 and I am a senior this year, my app is complete, it is relatively pretty and I am going to apply this cycle to NYU TUFTS (the two I would most like to go to) USC UNLV Midwestern and maybe BU or UoP. I am a white male so I do not have any minority points, I have been looking at last years cycle on predents.com (great resource) and I am cautious but not overly pessimistic. A one year non thesis masters would not be the worst thing in the world. The question that I pose is this, this term I am in two science classes, I am destroying them both (mostly because the material is concurrent with the DAT) and a math class (which I believe goes in the science GPA- please correct me if I am wrong), I have undoubtably an A in and will undoubtably get an A in. Ive done the calculations and this would push my GPA to a 3.21 and a 3.15 which looks a hell of a lot better if all goes well. My term ends first week of dec, grades posted in the middle of december, should I wait to submit my app? Would this jump in GPA be more helpful with a really late app or a worse GPA with a more time appropriate app.
Again, thank you all, best of luck with your current and future endeavors.
